Poem About An Owl

by Deborah Garrison I've never seen an owl Not a real one But often enough at night Have started up at the wingbeat: Long, with loaded silence between lengths Like velvet ripping The children's-book eyes Saucerish and startled with wisdom Sweeping the forest floor For a little something, a little something And I leapt from sleep If indeed I was sleeping Belted my robe like a mother of old And rushed to their beds to see If it got them, the skidding talon, Where they were quietly Breathing in their own Animal dreams "Poem About an Owl" by Deborah Garrison, from The Second Child. © Random House, 2007